


The Warlock’s Familiar

by HarkaSun



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Animal Transformation, Cat Alec Lightwood, Clizzy and Jimon are the side relationships, Comfort/Angst, Depression, Emotionally Hurt Magnus Bane, Everyone Is Gay, F/F, Familiar Alec Lightwood, Familiars, High Warlock of Brooklyn Magnus Bane, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Insecure Alec Lightwood, M/M, Magnus Bane has depression, Magnus Bane's Cat Eyes, POV Alternating, Protective Alec Lightwood, Shapeshifting, Soul Bond, Suicide Attempt, This is primarily about Malec, Warlock Magnus Bane, Warlocks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-18 14:08:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29491092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarkaSun/pseuds/HarkaSun
Summary: For over five years, Alec Lightwood has been denied his birth right: that of a familiar to be claimed by a warlock. When he finally finds that warlock, having talked him down from the ledge of Brooklyn Bridge, he despairs to find that the man wants nothing to do with him.With rising pressures from his family, and his warlock’s steadfast determination to shut him out, Alec must talk his way into Magnus’s home and heart. The only question is: how far will he go to claim his fate?
Relationships: Clary Fray/Isabelle Lightwood, Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood, Simon Lewis/Jace Wayland
Comments: 70
Kudos: 203





	1. Dark Waters Far Down

**Author's Note:**

> Back with a brand new story, just as promised! All gay multichapter for this one - I've never done Clizzy or Jimon before, so you may have to bear with me a little as I figure out how these relationships fit into my writing.The plan is to have it all from either Alec or Magnus's perspective anyway, so I'm hoping it'll be alright.
> 
> So, sit back, relax, (keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle) and enjoy the ride!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus Bane has lived a long and difficult life. Believing his fate is decided, he takes himself to the ledge of Brooklyn Bridge. Of all he had expected to happen up there, a familiar's presence is not something he was ever prepared for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short and intense chapter to start with - they will get longer, I'm just not good at beginnings.
> 
> CHAPTER WARNINGS: Suicide Plan/Attempt (Bridge)

Magnus doesn’t know when it got this bad.

The warlock’s life has been so long, _too_ long, too filled with heartache and hardship. There is only so much one person can take. Despite all the power in his blood, the magic burning beneath his skin, Magnus is only one man, one heart and soul. Many times in his life, he has thought himself unable to cope, unable to go on any longer.

Now, he knows it is true.

The edge of Brooklyn Bridge is cold and lonely. It is what he needs. In the end, he will always be alone. It is partly his own fault. His choices have ensured his solitude, but everything is better that way. Anyone who gets close to him suffers the consequences. Rather than subject an innocent soul to his shaky existence, he chooses solitude.

It is not what is meant to happen. As a warlock, he is destined to take a familiar, a shape-shifter to whose soul his own is connected. Familiar’s are often referred to as The Greatest Gift, an eternal companion to relieve the loneliness of immortality. The child had turned fifteen just over five years ago; Magnus had felt it like a shockwave, jolting him awake at midnight on September twelfth half a decade prior.

Immediately upon that shockwave, Magnus had done all he could to sever their connection rather than seek to claim the boy. Their bond could not be broken, however, so Magnus simply blocked it. It would have been devastating not to be claimed by a warlock on his fifteenth birthday, but Magnus knows in his heart that it is better than the alternative.

He thinks of that child as he stands atop the ledge, staring down at black waters far below. Magnus considers that he might have allied with a Wanderer, a lonesome warlock who’s familiar had died and who had yet to be united with another. It would be fitting. Unclaimed familiars often travelled with them.

Sometimes, Magnus imagines what his familiar is like. So many times, he has been tempted to reconnect their bond, to find him, but he never did. The boy has a chance to live now, to be whatever he wants without the responsibilities of being Magnus’s familiar. That fuels Magnus’s resolve for keeping him at bay. He tells himself it is for the best.

Sighing softly, Magnus lifts his eyes to the stars. Despair fills his heart, tears lining his cheeks. “I’m sorry,” he whispers into the night, hoping for once than his familiar will hear him, that he will know that Magnus is regretful for the pain this will cause, that he did this for him. “Forgive me.”

A suicidal warlock is not something any familiar would ever want. With their souls connected, every hint of pain and self-loathing would be transferred to them. In addition, if the warlock dies, then any familiar that they have claimed dies as well. Their souls are connected after all—the familiar’s magic is the warlock’s own—and without them, the familiar simply loses their will to go on, dies at their warlock’s side, loyal to the end.

In death, as in life, they belonged together.

That is mainly the reason for Magnus’s refusal to claim his last familiar. His soul is not fit to be borne by anyone anymore. He doesn’t want this boy to die.

“ _Warlock_.”

Magnus startles so badly he almost falls, but he grabs a rail to keep his balance, staring down at the water. The voice is not something he had been expecting. “Leave me,” he says, refusing to acknowledge whoever is there with him in the hopes that they will do as he says.

“ _No, I can’t. I’ve only just found you_.”

Magnus huffs and turns his head, prepared to snap at whoever would dare to interrupt him at a time like this. He has it ready on his tongue, how he is the High Warlock of Brooklyn and he will not be disobeyed. The big speech dies in his throat when he focuses to the side.

A cat sits next to him on the metal beam, long-furred and dark, hazel eyes shining in the moonlight. It is far too big to be a normal housecat cat, yet, with no collar, Magnus has to presume that is it a stray. Its fur is ungroomed, but clean. It blinks at him, slow and steady, and Magnus feels it.

There is magic in the creature; buried beneath that dark and slightly ragged fur is a spark of power, of a shared warlock essence. When their eyes meet, there is a pull deep in Magnus’s gut, his mark straining to be freed from its glamour. He breathes out slowly.

“You’re a familiar.”

“ _Yes_ ,” the cat replies, though its mouth doesn’t move, speaking directly into Magnus’s mind. His heart sinks as he realises what it all means. “ _I’m yours. I felt your distress… You’ve been hiding from me and I don’t understand why. I’m your familiar_.”

“You’re not _mine_. I haven’t claimed you,” Magnus says. “I’ve come this far alone.”

The cat follows his gaze down to the river far below. “ _Yes_ , _this far_ ,” it says, a long-furred tail twitching over large paws, “ _but no further?_ ”

“That is my business,” Magnus snaps. “Now go away.”

“ _You called for me_.”

“No, I didn’t!”

The cat’s tail flicked, impatience sparking those hazel eyes. “ _I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t… I’ve been waiting for a warlock to claim me. You were supposed to summon me. You didn’t. I thought there was something wrong with me, but it was you, wasn’t it…? You abandoned me_.”

Magnus closes his eyes. “I did,” he admits. “I felt you come of age and I decided against summoning you. I wanted you to live without the hardships of being my familiar. I am better alone and you are better without me.” He looks to the cat. “I don’t want you. Go home.”

“ _Come home_ ,” counters the familiar. “ _You don’t have to accept me, but don’t do this. Let me take you home. I will help you_.”

Magnus breathes out slowly, shakes his head. “You can’t help me.”

The cat flicks its tail, pushes up to its paws. “ _You could at least do me to courtesy of letting me try. It’s what I was born to do, what all of us were born to do… Familiars assist warlocks. It’s been that way for as long as anyone remembers… I am connected to you, whether you like it or not. Now let me help you_.”

Part of Magnus wants to be angry at that. The presumptuousness and the insolence of this cat. He doesn’t owe the familiar anything; he hasn’t claimed them and he doesn’t plan on claiming them. He doesn’t need to explain himself to anyone. It is quick to fade, however. The anger dissipates like air being let from a balloon and Magnus exhales slowly, gives an unsteady nod.

“I’m Magnus,” he says in a mumble.

Beside him, a golden light glows and Magnus turns in surprise at the tell-tale shade of his own magical essence. He hasn’t seen his power in another for a very long time.

The light fades and, in place of the cat that had been beside him just a moment before, stands a young man. Dark hair falls almost into his eyes, the exact colour of the cat’s long fur. Hazel eyes catch the moonlight, the lights from cars making their way across the bridge. The man gives him a cautious smile as he introduces himself with nothing but a name.

“Alec.”


	2. What is Made

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alec accompanies Magnus back to his apartment and tentatively questions him on the reasons for his abandonment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to those who commented on the first chapter: @all_fandoms_reader, @Melpomene55, @greengoddess3, and @PhoenixStar73.
> 
> I replied to the comments because first chapters tend to not attract a lot of commenters (at least in my experience), and I was pleasantly surprised to see people reacting to it! Will likely not reply in future chapters (see my profile if you need more info on that), but thank you very much for showing interest in the start of the story!

The High Warlock of Brooklyn is not what Alec imagined.

The depression, he expected. He knows that his warlock is depressed and self-harming, knows it because—despite every effort of Magnus’s to keep them apart—their souls are still bound. Alec has borne the cuts upon his skin, watched them begin to heal even before they had finished growing.

He had seen the same on his siblings: Jace and Isabelle. Their warlocks were hurt sometimes, and the injuries appeared just so briefly upon his sibling’s skin before disappearing. Their warlocks maintain the wounds until they heal naturally or through joining with their familiar’s magic. All magic was stronger when the soul-bound were brought together.

They were always accidental, however. His sibling’s warlocks would cut themselves cleaning up broken glass or walk into doors or trip on uneven ground; their magic didn’t prevent their clumsiness.

Alec’s warlock is different. Magnus is self-harming and suicidal. He knows that and he has known it for a long time now, for just over five years. In fact, the hours following midnight of his birthday, Alec’s arms had been slashed open with invisible blades. The pain had been brief, but the wounds came so consistently that it didn’t matter.

It’s something he has tried and failed to forget.

His disbelief comes with the fact that the high warlock is _his_ warlock. Everyone knows of Magnus Bane, the oldest warlock in the city, maybe the entire country, the warlock who—rumour has it—has never once claimed a familiar. It is believed that he simply cannot connect with them; some say it’s due to his father being a greater demon, that the circumstances of his birth mean his magic is too powerful for a familiar to hold.

Alec understands now that they are wrong.

He watches Magnus alter his warding before opening the door and permitting Alec into his loft. Magnus is a glamorous man, his clothes and the jewellery he wears tell Alec that much, and his apartment is equally reflective of that. The interior is all marble busts and abstract art, bare brick walls and gossamer curtains. There are a minimal number of doors, many of the rooms leading openly into one another.

A beautiful home tainted in the sorrow of its occupant.

Magnus strides into his apartment and Alec follows him silently. The warlock grabs a scrap of paper from a small table in the entranceway, scrunching it into a ball and tossing it in the direction of a metal bin. The paper disappears into it with a soft _thunk_. Alec frowns at it, wondering what it might have been.

In the kitchen, Alec leans against the island counter while Magnus magics ingredients into a mug. “Do you want anything?” he asks, seeming to be out of courtesy more than actual concern for Alec’s desires.

“Milk, if you’ve got it,” says Alec, understanding the cliché of it, but having developed an insatiable taste for it over these past years.

Magnus huffs softly. “You want that in a bowl or a glass?”

“A glass, while I’m in human form. If I were in my animal body, I’d take a bowl.”

Magnus snaps his fingers and a glass of milk appears in front of Alec in a puff of gold magic. Alec recognises the same colour as his own, as the shade he is engulfed with when he morphs his form. He elects not to point it out. Magnus must have already made that connection.

The warlock stirs his drink absently, tosses the spoon into the sink and takes the mug in hand as he turns to the island, sits at a stool opposite Alec. His eyes are dark and, for the time being, they don't meet Alec's own.

“What do you want from me?”

Alec sips his milk to bide his time, thinking as he drinks. “I’m not sure,” he says, as a man who prides himself on his honesty. “An explanation would be a nice start if you’re up for it.”

Magnus fixes him with a hard look. “The bridge wasn’t explanation enough?”

“Is that why you abandoned me…? Because of your depression?”

Magnus refuses to meet his eyes suddenly. “I wish you wouldn’t say it like that. _Abandoned_. I didn’t abandon you. We never met.”

“You were supposed to summon me,” says Alec, fighting to hold his anger. He has contained it for so long now. “I was fifteen years old. I waited for you. All night leading into my birthday, all day when you didn’t come. When midnight struck for the thirteenth, I knew you weren’t going to summon me. I _waited_ for you and you never came. Do you have any idea what people were saying about me? My mother almost kicked me out when I refused to pair with a wanderer.”

Magnus frowns at him. “Kicked you out…? When you were fifteen?”

“I’m a Lightwood. My family have been familiars for centuries,” says Alec, thinking suddenly that Magnus doesn’t understand how serious refusing to summon a familiar can be, especially for someone like Alec. “My ancestors have been claimed by the greatest warlocks of their respective generations and my parents run the Lightwood Institute. When you refused to claim me, you subjected me to years to ridicule. I felt you suffer for half a decade.”

He swallows hard, thinking now that he is being too harsh when he considers what Magnus has been through tonight, what has happened over these past five or so years. It’s a subtle movement when Alec unconsciously runs his fingertips along the inside of his wrist.

“Do you still have the scars…?”

If the way the warlock averts his eyes is any indication, the evidence of his cutting is still very much visible. A pang of guilt at his own ability to heal strikes Alec’s heart. The familiar stands silently, wandering around the island. Magnus shifts at his approach like he wants to run.

He doesn’t.

Alec lightly touches Magnus’s wrist, the skin visible just below his palm, looks to the warlock’s face for consent. Magnus roughly pushes his sleeve up to give Alec access to his wrist and forearm. The familiar reaches and strokes a hand over his forearm, feels what has been done there on his skin.

“You should have summoned me sooner,” he says, a soft chiding to his tone. “I felt you, but I couldn’t find you.”

Magnus shakes his head. “You shouldn’t have been able to feel that.”

Alec smiles sadly. “Your magic may be strong, but we are soul-bound. You couldn’t hold me back forever.” His expression returns to simply pure sadness, the pad of his thumb trailing the length of a particularly bad scar. “I could feel this… When you’re in pain like that… When it was self-inflicted… I felt you.”

“I’m sorry,” Magnus says, and it sounds as though he means it, “but I _did_ try to keep this from you. I tried to sever our connection, but I only succeeded in blocking it.” He shakes his head with a soft sigh. “I didn’t summon you because I didn’t want you to have to deal with me and my shit… You were a child. Even now, I don’t want this for you. I want you to live without inheriting my suffering. If I die and I claimed you—”

“I would die too. Yes, I know.”

Alec sits himself on the stool beside the warlock, gently slips his sleeve back down to cover his wrist. The scars have healed under his touch, fading into nothing as if they were never there. He isn’t sure if Magnus had noticed. It hadn’t been intentional, of course. To heal is simply instinct.

“Why are you so sad…?”

Magnus surveys him with glamoured eyes, breathing out slow and silent. “Alec, I’m sure you have heard rumours about me, so allow me to clear them up for you… I was born in twelve eighty-three. I am seven hundred and thirty-five years old and I have seen so many things. Much of it is beautiful… and much of it is not… I have had so many familiars. I can’t watch another die.”

Alec shakes his head. “I thought you… I didn’t think you’d ever had a familiar. Everyone says you never claimed one.”

“It has been over a century since my last familiar was lost to me,” says Magnus. “I haven’t felt one come of age since. I suspected I had lost the ability to summon them. Then, I felt you… and I closed myself off to you rather than subject you to my faults.”

Alec ducks his gaze a little. “I’m sorry. I never knew you lost so many.”

Magnus tilts his head a little. “Not all of them died… Many of them disconnected from me; they had me revoke my claim upon them. They couldn’t handle me for long. I am too difficult to be bound to.” He lifts his gaze. “I told myself I was being kind by refusing to claim you. That is a half-truth… I didn’t want to be hurt again.”

All the new information is a strain on Alec’s mind. He is quiet a moment, allowing himself time to process. Magnus is almost eight hundred years old. In that time, he must have had several familiars come and go. Alec wonders which was his favourite. He wonders why Magnus decided enough was enough once it was Alec’s turn.

There are too many questions in his mind. He knows he has asked enough for this evening considering what Magnus has been through in the last hour alone. The warlock must be exhausted.

“I’ll leave if that’s what you want,” says Alec, “but our bond is reconnected now, so I’d rather be here if it’s all the same to you.”

“It isn’t,” says Magnus, quite firmly, and Alec’s heart sinks low in his chest. “I haven’t had another person stay the night in my home since…” he trails, brow pinches like he’s lost his train of through, “a very long time.” He is quiet a moment, his eyes glassy suddenly. “Go home, Alexander.”

The warlock turns away and wanders across the living room, heading for a door on the far side.

“Magnus, wait,” Alec calls after him, ensuring to keep his voice calm enough, soft enough that Magnus doesn’t worry that he’s going to keep pushing. The warlock stops, looks back over his shoulder. “Just one thing… Why did I feel you? You said you blocked our bond because you couldn’t sever it completely, but why could I still feel… what you did?”

Magnus breathes out slowly, meets his eyes. “What is made… cannot be unmade.”

Alec frowns, opens his mouth to query, but Magnus is gone, disappearing into another room and sliding the door shut behind him. It isn’t clear to Alec what he means; if he is talking about their bond or his scars or something else entirely. Warlocks can be cryptid.

Alec is determined not to be pushed away by Magnus’s confusing and wholly unwelcoming nature. He will return to the institute now, as Magnus wishes, but it won’t be so simple to force him aside. As long as Magnus can tolerate him, he will do everything in his power to stay.

Pausing on his way out, Alec eyes the trashcan beside the door, his gaze lingering on the scrunch of tan paper. It would be wrong to take it. Magnus threw it away deliberately and visibly. He doesn’t want it to be seen. On the other hand, Magnus is his warlock; at least, he should have been.

Before he leaves, Alec grabs the balled-up paper and shoves it into his pocket. The door swings shut behind him and the wards flare to lock him out of Magnus’s life once more.


	3. The Lightwood Institute

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alec returns to his family home at the Lightwood Institute. There, he consults the Registry of Familiars, seeking answers about Magnus's past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thank you @Princess_Kopyytko, @Melpomene55, @all_fandoms_Reader, @draconicflyer. @PrincessTiannah, @master_girl, @dani_dabbles, and @AbbyJayWall for your comments on the last chapter! I'm not used to this kind of attention so early in the story; you're all so kind!

The library is silent and untouched, as always.

Of all the rooms in his family’s manor, this is the only one that is consistently abandoned. The Lightwood Institute is home not only to Alec’s blood relatives, but to numerous familiar’s who have yet to be claimed by a warlock, children waiting to come of age.

Alec’s family trains them in correct manners, in warlock etiquette, in how to fight and how to control their shift, all so that they might best defend and serve the ones who claim them. Some are sent by their families like a boarding school; some find a sanctuary here after running or being kicked out of their own homes.

A seal of approval from the Lightwood Institute is highly sought-after in a familiar. There are full ceremonies for those graduating the Institute. They are given their certificates and sent off into the world, claimed or not. If they fail to be summoned when they come of age, they are forced out. Alec had been permitted to stay only because of his blood—truly, only because his father and his siblings argued with his mother for days after the incident.

They had all assumed that Alec simply didn’t have a warlock. Alec himself had known different. He had known the truth and he had concealed it rather than subject his warlock to a witch hunt—for lack of a better term—from his mother. Despite the abandonment, Alec had protected him.

Of course, it isn’t him alone who has been subject to his mother’s ridicule these past years. Jace and Isabelle’s summoning’s and subsequent claiming’s had hardly been ideal. Their warlocks were young and untested, and Alec’s mother had been less than thrilled about Clary’s family history and about Simon’s first failed attempt to claim a familiar. They _were_ summoned, however, and claimed, and that was good enough.

That was so much better than being abandoned.

Although Alec has his teachings—specialising in certain forms of combat and in guiding focus of animal instincts while in human form—he spends almost every second of his free time in the library, lost between the shelves upon shelves of books, reading about familiars and warlocks and his family history. From the second his warlock failed to claim him, Alec had perused every book in this room a dozen times over and learned much about the world he was born into.

He learned that it could be common to be abandoned, that warlocks were sometimes so damaged that they physically could no longer summon a familiar. He learned that warlocks often already _had_ familiars even when another came of age, and that they may put off the summoning or take a second. He learned that he may get another chance if another warlock is born who can match his soul; although, if that should be the case, he would be a father-figure to them rather than anything else.

Today, he is looking for something very specific.

The Registry of Familiars is a huge and ancient book sat upon a pedestal in the corner of the room. Covered with dark leather and bound with a thick, black thread, the silver-worn sigil of the Lightwood flames inlaid in the front only succeed in increasing the books imposition. The heads of the Lightwood house have guarded it jealously for years, gathering information on familiars and their warlocks for centuries.

Only the eldest members of the household are permitted to light the surrounding candles and look upon the worn pages that are divided up into columns—starting the warlocks name (or a sketch of their mark if unclear), their familiar’s name and their animal form, with the Lightwood emblem stamped in the final column if that familiar has passed through the institute. If the familiar has died, a droplet of black ink will be pressed beside their name, along with the year of their passing.

Alec strikes one of the matches at the side of the book to light the five crimson candles around it. The squared, silver borders of the leather-bound ledger shine in the warm light. The spine creaks and cracks as he opens the cover. In this moment, he doesn’t care that it’s forbidden to so much as look upon these pages.

He’s never broken the rules before. If he is honest with himself, it’s actually quite exciting. He thinks he might understand his siblings’ proclivity for rebellion now.

He looks to the very first entry, presses a fingertip to the date of death. “Fifteen hundreds,” he mutters, reading the number aloud. “Why does it only go back five hundred years...?”

He scans the page regardless, searching for his would-be warlock on the worn parchment. The tip of his index finger rests on the list of warlocks, trailing down and flicking pages until he finds what he’s looking for, hidden away in nothing but a miniature doodle inked in gold.

“Golden cat’s eye,” he says in a whisper as he follows the row across to the familiar. “Imasu Morales... Oriole.”

Alec doesn’t know what an oriole is, but after a quick phone search he discovers it is a type of bird. The Lightwood emblem hasn’t been stamped in the final column. There is a black splotch beside the name, the sign of death. Magnus’s mark doesn’t have one.

As he flicks through the book, Alec finds the cat’s eye present at least a couple of times a century, always accompanied by a familiar with a blotched name, all gone now. As he reaches the 1900s, he finds Magnus’s mark once again.

“George,” Alec mutters the name of his familiar, a German Shepard. There is a black dot beside the man’s name. The year reads 1918.

That is the last Alec can find of Magnus in the registry. He closes it with a huff.

1918 is an important year for the mundanes; the year their first war ended. Alec’s heart aches to think of Magnus in the midst of all that violence and destruction and death, despairs even further when he considers that the warlock’s last familiar had likely lost his life in such a war.

“Alec?”

He startles at that, at the suddenness of a voice in such a silent place, and he turns to see his brother stood behind him, canting his head in soft confusion. Alec breathes out slowly.

“What are you doing in here?”

“Maryse is looking for you,” Jace replies, coming to look at the open registry and clicking his tongue in mock disapproval. “What’re you up to? Breaking the rules?”

Alec pouts softly, fighting to figure out a good excuse, wondering if he even needs to. Lying to his brother might be the worst thing he could do; however, he knows that, if he tells Jace now, it is only a matter of time before everyone else finds out. It’s only a matter of time before their parents are told.

“What does my mother want?” he asks, rather than answer the question.

Jace shakes his head. “Something about taking on a few of Izzy’s shifts—some personal lessons with the kids about how to use their animal forms. Apparently, some rogue warlock is causing a bit of havoc and Izzy’s reluctant to leave Clary’s apartment. She’s instant on the warding being as strong as it can.” He shrugs one shoulder. “I’m not too worried.”

“You’re never worried,” retorts Alec with a quirk of a smile. “Don’t forget that Clary _needs_ Isabelle’s help with the wards. She’s not like the other warlocks.”

Jace hums his realisation. “Yeah, shit, I forgot about that. Guess I’m used to Simon being… Well, I suppose ‘competent’ isn’t really the right word. Let’s say that he manages.”

“Jace,” Alec says quietly, finding that a good enough segue and pursing his lips a little in thought. Jace would understand. His summoning was complicated too. “I don’t mean to pry, but I have to ask… how long did it take you to get on the same page with Simon?”

Jace chuckles. “Not sure we are now,” he says with another, nonchalant shrug. “I was his second choice… and I came so soon after he was rejected by his first familiar that we just rushed right in because he was afraid he would never get to claim anyone. It was kind of stupid of us, I guess. We barely got to know each other and I wasn’t even sure about it… Even now, he’s young and stupid. We both are. We fight constantly. A lot of the time, I just morph and ignore him… Feathers are a lot of work, y’know. I can just pretend to preen.”

“Bet he sees right through that,” Alec mutters, wanting to correct him on the whole ‘second choice’ aspect of it, but unable to find to words.

“Of course he does; he’s my warlock,” Jace says, tilts his head. “Why are you asking this now? What’s brought this on?”

Alec hesitates. “Well, it’s just… it’s only because…” He takes a steadying breath. “Jace, I found my warlock.”

His brother’s eyes widen with shock. “Are you serious? You have one?”

“Yes, I felt him last night like… like a pull in my chest. I just followed it and, my warlock, he…” Alec shakes his head. “He’s been using magic to block our connection since I came of age. I… Jace I only found him because he needed help _so_ badly. He was in such a state. He was… God, he was going to…”

“Hey,” Jace says, grabbing his brother’s arms and clicking his tongue in sympathy. “You know what they are. You know that their age… that kind of time, it changes a person.” His brow pinches in soft anxiety. “You said he was blocking you so… so it was his choice? How long has he been without a familiar?”

Alec shakes his head. “I don’t know, but… I think somehow it’s been at least a century.”

Jace frowns. “Is that even possible?”

“You remember all those stories about warlocks we were told as kids?” asks Alec. “These warlocks who’ve lived for hundreds and hundreds of years, close to millennia.”

“Yeah, but the warlocks in those stories, they were children of greater demons. Warlocks don’t live that long normally. They get killed or they end it themselves after losing their familiars. The whole point of us is to act as help for them, to lend strength and protection… without us they’re just… they get empty… sad. They lose that strength. Most of them don’t survive to the next potential claiming.”

“Well, I think this one has,” says Alec, reluctant to tell Jace that his warlock _is_ the son of a greater demon. “I think he’s survived over and over again.” He pouts softly, thoughtfully. “What if the real reason he didn’t claim me is because… because he knows I could never live up to his past familiars? I could never be enough for someone like him.”

Jace grabs his arm. “Hey, don’t,” he says, his voice as firm as his grasp. “If that’s what he thinks, then he’s a dick and he doesn’t deserve you.”

Alec sighs softly and runs a hand up into his hair. There are so many emotions roiling inside him. He recognises some from when he turned fifteen and failed to be claimed; frustration, irritation, sorrow, desperation. Mostly, he’s just confused. He’s a familiar. To be paired with a warlock is his birth right.

It feels _wrong_ , like there is a hole right in the centre of his chest. Without a warlock, he is lost.

There is a call from behind and both men whip around to see their mother marching towards them, followed less angrily by their father. “What are you doing lighting the registry?” Maryse asks, a sharp disapproval to her voice. “You know that only the heads of the house may light these candles.”

“Alec found his warlock.”

Alec shoots his brother a scathing look, but Jace just shrugs, unashamed by his immediate and barely prompted revelation. Alec supposes he was just trying to keep them both from any further ridicule about the damned candles. Their parents, of course, have queries.

“Who are they?”

Alec pauses a moment, turning back to blow out the candles before facing his parents, buying himself those few precious seconds before he must accept his destiny. “It’s Magnus Bane.”

Jace exclaims in shock, his father claps him on the shoulder and his mother immediately embraces him, all displeasure gone from her demeanour. She’s a difficult woman to please and Alec has not seen her pride directed at him since before his failed summoning. “Oh, Alec, that’s wonderful! The High Warlock of Brooklyn no less! He’s claimed you, I trust?”

“No, mother,” Alec admits and she pulls away from him with a confused frown, “and I don’t know if he ever will. He hasn’t had a familiar for over a century. He doesn’t want me. He told me himself.”

“Then you will make him want you,” says his mother, her expression filling with unsympathetic determination. _There,_ Alec thinks, his heart sinking. “Surely he knows the value of a familiar. You will be his. In the peak of his life—Alec, you understand how important this will be for our family?”

“Maryse,” Robert chides a little. “Surely you can allow them a little time to get acquainted.”

“’Get acquainted’,” Maryse echoes with a soft scoff. “They are soul-bound, Robert.”

Alec shakes his head. “I need time,” he admits, swallowing hard when his mother gives him a sharp look. “He doesn’t want me. I need time to convince him.”

Maryse sniffs, lifts her head. “Don’t come back until it’s done.”

“Maryse, you can’t just—”

“Yes, mother,” Alec agrees quickly, knowing that the alternative would be his mother closing the doors of their home to him forever. He gives his father a reassuring nod when he looks torn. “I know what this will mean for the Lightwood’s reputation if I’m successful. Trust me, please… I can do this.”


	4. Felidae Facies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alec returns to Magnus's apartment, desperate to be at least given a chance—lest he fail his mother and find himself without a home at all. The warlock gives his terms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much to those who left kudos, and particularly those who commented on the last chapter: @all_fandoms_reader, @PhoenixStar73, @Melpomene55, @Magy97, @dani_dabbles, @master_girl, and @sosowhat! Sorry for the late(r) update - had some problems structuring this chapter, but I think it turned out okay!
> 
> WARNING! this chapter includes a suicide note. Take care of yourselves and be kind to yourselves.

The penthouse apartment of Nightingale Towers is warded to him.

Alec absently traces a finger close to the barrier, watching it flare gold with his warlock’s magic. There is a pull deep is his gut and he closes his eyes, retracts his hand from the warding. Better than anyone, he understands control. If he gives in to the impulse, Magnus’s magic could very well burn him alive.

“Magnus,” he calls out, taking a step back from the door as he does so. “Magnus, it’s Alec! We need to talk!”

There is a long pause. Alec narrows his eyes, tilts his head to better listen into the apartment. He picks up the sound of footsteps with enhanced hearing, and draws his head back, reeling in that cat-like focus. The door opens almost silently, just the soft click of a few locks, and Magnus is stood there, staring at Alec from inside his loft.

“You’re back,” Magnus says, although his tone is blank like he isn’t surprised in the slightest.

Alec tilts his head. “Can I come in?”

The warlock says nothing for a moment, regards Alec almost curiously. In answer, he simply clicks his fingers, draws the warding down, and steps aside, opening the door wider as he does so. Alec walks in, scanning the apartment.

There are two cats that he can see in the main room. One of them, a short-haired tabby, meets his gaze and holds it. Alec stares back until the cat blinks slowly and turns away. Alec innately understands that as a sign of trust, knowing deep down that the cats submission is due to the feline form he holds inside. Aside from the animals, Magnus’s loft looks much the same as the last time Alec was here.

“What can I do for you, Alec?” Magnus asks, almost a sigh.

Before the familiar can reply, Magnus goes to a coffee table in the centre of the room, gathers up a cup and saucer. Alec frowns at that, at Magnus using a mundane way to clear his crockery when he could simply have it done with a snap of his fingers. It doesn’t matter right now. He needs to be convincing and he isn't well-versed in that at all.

“You might not like this,” begins Alec, taking a breath as he follows Magnus to the kitchen, “but I want to be your familiar and I don’t want you to deny me without at least giving me a chance. So, here’s my proposition: I want to complete a try-out period. There will be no obligation for you to claim me, but I want to be here for your day-to-day work. I want to help you, and I want you to see me.”

“I can see you,” says Magnus and Alec catches sight of a spark of darkness in his eyes when he sets the cup and saucer down beside the sink, a little too forcefully, and turns to face the familiar, “and what I see is a stubborn young man who doesn’t know when to take ‘no’ and be on his way.”

Alec lifts his head in defiance. “I’m a Lightwood,” he says firmly. “I’m afraid stubbornness is a hereditary characteristic. You might not want me, but you don’t strike me as the selfish type, so this is your opportunity to make up for the last five or so years.”

Magnus’s expression twisted in anger and Alec took a breath, straightening his posture. He may have gone too far. Maybe it is what they both needed. Alec had to say it. Maybe Magnus is enraged by hearing it, but he needs to understand what he did. He needs to be aware of the consequences of his actions.

“Selfish?” Magnus echoes, tilts his head. “You don’t know anything about me. Do not presume to start name-calling.”

“You don’t know me either,” says Alec. “That’s exactly my point. We don’t understand each other and I want us to try.” He takes a deep breath. “Can you try? Can you let _me_ try?”

Magnus is quiet a long moment, so long that Alec worries he might never reply, worries that—if he does respond—what his answer will be. If Magnus denies him, he will have no choice but to live as a stray in his animal form every night. His mother had made herself very clear: Alec was not to return without being claimed. If Magnus denies him completely, Alec doesn’t know what he’ll do.

“I’d like to see you in your cat form again,” Magnus says unexpectedly. “If you would be so kind.”

Alec blinks quickly and nods, hesitates a moment and glances back to the main room. “Am I going to upset your other cats?” he asks before he shifts.

Magnus shrugs softly. “I don’t know. One way to find out.”

Alec hums and wills himself to change, gold magic engulfing his body. Soon enough, he is at Magnus’s knee. He sits and stares up at the warlock, gives him a soft chirping sound in greeting. Magnus regards him a moment, crouches to examine him.

It’s an intimate kind of moment. Alec’s ear flicks unconsciously, anxious that Magnus will find his animal form weak or displeasing. If the various cats lounging around his apartment are any indication, however, he clearly has no aversion to the species. If anything, the opposite appears to be true. Magnus is a cat person. He apparently just isn’t an Alec person.

“Interesting,” Magnus murmurs and Alec’s tail twitches over his paws. “You’re a lot larger than the average housecat.” He absently touches Alec’s pointed ears. “A Maine Coon. That makes sense. Cats are sophisticated, independent, proud, but if there are any who act most like a dog, it’s the Maine Coon. A fitting form for you, Alec. I see two sides to you. I feel as though you’re trying to hide that excitable, puppy dog personality.”

“ _I don’t have a puppy dog personality_ ,” Alec insists, projecting his voice into Magnus’s mind, flicking his tail in disapproval.

Magnus smiles softly and Alec blinks slow, stares up at him. “Ah, the haughtiness of the feline. Excellent.”

Alec rises to his paws, sticks his nose up in the air and stalks away into the next room, his tail high. He knows he’s proving Magnus’s point, but it’s worth it to look back and see the warlock’s smile as he follows. That room he is entering turns out to be Magnus’s apothecary; an ironic coincidence, considering that Alec should have been assisting him in here for the past half-decade.

Rocking his haunches, Alec leaps up onto a small cupboard against the wall beside the open door. Magnus watches him in something akin to curiosity as he bounds gracefully to the top of the shelves lined with jars and boxes of herbs and potion ingredients. Alec keeps shooting glances back at him, determined to keep up with his expressions and his body language.

Alec picks his way over the ones on the top shelf, careful paws treading sure and certain. He finds a clear space at the end and settles down there, wrapping his thick tail over large paws. He turns his eyes down at Magnus as the warlock comes to stare up at him.

“Impressive,” he says, “and you didn’t knock anything off, so you’re more considerate than the others. Although, I don’t usually allow the cats in this room.”

“ _I’m not one of your cats_ ,” Alec reminded him, fighting to prevent his voice from becoming snide. “ _Remember?_ ”

There’s a hint of disapproval in Magnus’s hum, but he says nothing in response. Alec pounces off the top shelf and to the floor, lands gracefully and drops to sitting, curling his long tail over large paws. Magnus crouches in front of him, reaching out to cup one ear and rubbing a thumb up to the tuft. Alec lets him. It feels nice, like someone playing with his hair.

“Do you still have that piece of paper I threw out the other day?”

Alec stiffens, stares up at him. Magnus doesn’t seem angry. If anything, he is… tired.

Regardless, it isn’t a conversation Alec is happy to have in his cat form. He morphs back in a flash of gold, stands as Magnus does. They take one another in for a moment, perhaps each regarding the other in a new light now. Magnus has seen his form up close and personal, and, in that form, Alec has detected his true feelings.

Magnus is _tired_. It seeps from him like an odour and, now that Alec has seen it, he can’t shake it off.

“How did you know I took it?” Alec asks.

Magnus just looks at him. “I’m a warlock… I know when things are out of place.”

Alec ducks his head, brings forth the paper from his pocket, untouched since he fished it from the trashcan just the other night. “I’m sorry,” he says, holds it out for Magnus to reclaim. “I haven’t smoothed it out. I don’t know what’s on it. It was wrong of me to take it.”

“Read it,” Magnus says unexpectedly and Alec blinks in rapid shock.

When he lifts his head, the eyes he meets are dark and emotionless.

“Take tonight to read and consider. If you wish to continue with your… ‘trial-run’, return to me on the morrow. I’ll take your assistance in my daily life, but not your presence in my home for any longer than is required. You may continue to live at your institute.”

Alec swallows hard, knowing that isn't an option, but not wishing to burden Magnus with that. The warlock seems like a suspicious person and if Alec tells him the truth of his situation... Magnus will never believe it. Instead, he settles on, “you’re letting me in?”

“Read first,” says Magnus, as if it's important but he's trying to hide just how much, “then decide. If you come, I will let you in. If not… we can both continue as we were.”

Continuing as they were would mean homelessness for Alec and death for Magnus. Alec doesn’t want that for either of them. He is almost tempted to read the letter right here and now, to throw it away as Magnus had and fall upon his knees to pledge his eternal service to the warlock.

He doesn’t.

“Tomorrow,” he says and Magnus nods his affirmation. “I’ll be here.”

Magnus hums like he finds that unlikely and turns away. As with last time, Alec takes that as his cue to leave. The terms are agreeable enough. He is asking Magnus to share his life with him. If they were mundane, it would be an insane thing to commit to. Since they’re not, however, Alec feels robbed by Magnus refusing to claim him.

That isn’t his main concern for now, however. Now, he needs to find somewhere to spend the night.

* * *

It is in a wet alley of Brooklyn Heights that Alec settles down to read the letter.

It’s as good a place as any to be alone. He can’t return to the institute and Magnus doesn’t want him back at the loft until tomorrow morning. Alec realises slowly that he has nowhere to go. If Magnus keeps his promise and allows Alec into his apartment, then, as soon as the day ends, Alec will return to the streets.

Having spent the afternoon searching, however, Alec has yet to find a suitable place to spend the night, so he elects to read the letter. The paper is creased and worn and Alec fears tearing it when he smooths it out across his thigh. Upon the tan parchment, black ink loops in an elegant hand. Even before he reads them, Alec knows these are Magnus’s words.

_My Dearest Catarina and Raphael,_

_I hope you can forgive me for doing this in written form, and for resorting to my old ways and words. I feared that, should I speak to you both in person, you would never let me go. And you must._

_I am so tired now. Even as I write this, I prepare to leave for the bridge. I’m sorry. This has been a long time coming. There are too many years on my soul. I am dying, my friends, my family. I have been dying for decades._

_Know that I love you both dearly. Know that you are the only two people left in this world to whom I deemed to bid my farewells. Know that, without you, I would never have made it this far. It is my time now. I cannot continue. I tried._

_Know that I tried._

_If you ever happen to find my would-be familiar, tell him what became of me. Tell him not to despair. If he has not yet been claimed when you see him, assure him that another will come, stronger than I was. Although I never met him, I know in my heart that he is good._

_I love you both. One day, I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive me._

_With all my love,_

_Magnus Bane_

There are tears sliding down Alec’s cheeks when he lifts his head. A droplet or two spills onto the paper, making the ink run a little over Magnus’s love. Alec takes a heavy breath. The sobs wrench from him in silence, desperate gasps shaking his entire body as the paper is fisted into a ball in one of his hands.

He wants to throw it. To cast it upon the ground and set it alight and never see it or speak of it again. That won’t erase it from his mind, however.

Two people.

Magnus cares about two people in this world and he wrote this presumably for them to find. These words. These beautiful, awful words; they were never meant for Alec. This was never meant to be. If he had been a few minutes, or even seconds later in getting to the bridge, Magnus would be gone.

Catarina and Raphael would have found this letter. They may have wept for him as Alec does now, but it sounds as though they had known about Magnus’s tendencies. His _problems_. Alec wonders if they know what he knows. Maybe they do. Maybe they had been the ones to clean the blood from Magnus’s wrists.

One thing is certain: this isn’t a letter that Alec holds in his hands. It’s a suicide note.

There is a sound from further down the alleyway and Alec glances to see a truck backing into it. It isn’t close, but there are people getting out of the truck and coming out of the building and Alec suspects they won’t be happy with him sitting there. He shoves Magnus’s suicide note into his pocket, unsure of what else to do with it, stands and walks away.

The sky is getting darker now and Alec is weighing his options. Magnus is decided; he is determined to be of use, to be a familiar and to help the depressed warlock. What he can’t decide is if it’s more dangerous to be a homeless person or a stray cat in New York. As a cat, he has less chance of getting stabbed, but as a human, he has less chance of getting caught by the Feral Cat Initiative and neutered.

In the end, he opts for his cat form and he decides to be very careful about where he rests.

The street cats of Brooklyn shy away from him when he passes them, sensing the power inside him, their ears flattening down and their legs crouching low in a sign of submission. It’s better this way. He keeps away from them, keeps to the shadows of the alleys as much as he can. Though his cat form is more durable to the street environment, he will stand out from the regular strays with him being so large.

When night falls, he jumps through a broken window of an abandoned building and sleeps under a dusty table that has been draped in an off-white sheet. It smells old and musty, but it’s sheltered and safe enough, so Alec doesn’t mind so much. It is a restless night’s sleep, his mind filled with Magnus.

The warlock is so damaged. Perhaps it isn’t fair of Alec to be so persistent about his claiming; Magnus has clearly claimed and lost a dozen familiars in the past and survived almost a hundred years without a chance to claim another. He had wanted to end his life that night on the bridge. Alec sometimes feels as though it wasn’t in his right to stop him.

What could he offer Magnus really? It is said that a familiar is a warlock’s greatest gift, but Magnus has had so many that Alec isn’t sure he can live up to being ‘the greatest’ anything. It’s a lot of pressure.

Sleep comes shyly to him and, in his dreams, he is stood before a dog. The animal is brown and black and larger than him by a few inches. As a cat, Alec is innately uneasy by its presence. Deep brown eyes bore into his own, magic burning beneath coarse fur, and Alec knows it is a familiar.

“ _Mih evas ot evah uoy_.”

Alec blinks, shakes his head. “I don’t understand,” he says and his mouth moves. “I’m sorry. I—I don’t speak whatever you’re speaking.”

“ _Mih evas ot evah uoy_ ,” the dog repeats effortlessly, it’s face motionless, it’s eyes dancing with flame, reflecting a fire that Alec can’t see.

Shaking his head, Alec tries to step back, but he can’t move. Something is whistling in the air above him, louder and louder by the second. “I don’t know what you’re saying,” he insists, his voice rising in panic. “Please, I don’t understand! What’s that sound? What’s happening?”

There is a crash like the ending of the world and Alec jolts awake with his claws buried in the wooden floorboards. Sunlight presses against the cloth and Alec pushes his head out from under it to meet the day. There are people in the building, a woman with a hardhat pointing at walls and speaking instructively to a group of nodding men in high-vis jackets.

Alec creeps to the broken window and leaps out before they can notice him.

In the alleyway outside, he ensures he is alone before slipping into his human body. Cat hair clings to his clothes and he brushes it off with absent hands. It’s his outfit from yesterday, but he doesn’t suppose it will matter much to Magnus considering the things they have seen of one another. Alec, at least, has seen Magnus at—what he can only hope is—his most vulnerable moment.

He despairs to think that Magnus has been through much worse in his long life, but he knows it’s all too likely that he has. Something must have led him to standing on the edge of Brooklyn Bridge. Magnus’s life has been long and full of hardship and heartbreak and Alec feels wrong for forcing his way into that.

But he wants this. He wants this like he’s never wanted anything.

The trip to Magnus’s apartment is short and Alec knocks on the door this time. The wards do nothing to deter him. They don't even seem to be up. The warlock opens the door and stares at him. His eyes darken when Alec presents the letter, but widen a little in surprise as Alec scrunches up the suicide note in his hands, dropping it into the wastepaper basket just inside the loft.

“I’m here,” he says firmly, “for whatever you need. I’m here.”


	5. The Rules of a Forgotten Past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It has been over a century since Magnus has had a familiar in his home and, should he be entirely honest with himself, he may have forgotten their purpose. The only thing he is certain of is that he does not wish for Alec to know him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to @Liz_060, @Linwin, @draconicflyer, @Melpomene55, @sosowhat, @master_girl, @PrincessTiannah, @Coralight, @all_fandoms_reader, and @dani_dabbles for your comments on the last chapter!

It isn’t out of spite or dislike, but Magnus continues his day without Alec’s help.

He hasn’t had a familiar in decades, in over a century, and, in all honesty, he almost forgets what they are even for. Having spent the last few decades lounging in his nightclub, ruining himself through his indulgence, Magnus isn’t ready to start acting like a proper warlock again.

Those gifted with magic had long ago taken it upon themselves to help. The mundane world knew nothing of their lives, but warlocks had assisted them throughout history, providing covert aid in their wars and their problems. Magnus remembered a time when warlocks would travel across the world performing miracles and people praised them as having been sent by God.

As times changed, the world to which they have given so much quickly turned on them. Barely two hundred years into his life, mundanes in Europe and colonised America began to convict thousands of warlocks and wrongly accused mundanes of witchcraft, began killing them in their thousands. Magnus had spent those years freeing mundanes and fellow warlocks from capture and he had made quite a name for himself doing it.

It’s part of how he gained the title of High Warlock. His people came before anything. For years now, they were all that he had in life. He had put them first over everything, over his happiness, over his safety; at the slightest sign of need, he would go to any one of them and offer his help. It was all he could do considering he couldn’t help himself.

Now, of course, things are a little more complicated.

Alec sits on the workbench of his apothecary in feline form, watching Magnus put together potions and scribble things in a leather-bound book. The warlock works in silence; he always does. Alec doesn’t interrupt or speak or even move for hours. He is like a stone carving on the tabletop. When Magnus lifts his head, he does a double-take, almost forgetting that Alec was there.

Hazel eyes are inquiring and unblinking, shining like two marbles of copper that have been polished within an inch of their lives. He’s a fine creature, a strong familiar. Anyone would be lucky to have him. Unfortunately for him, however, fate has chosen to have his soul bound to Magnus, and Magnus is anything but lucky.

“I’m not used to having a familiar,” the warlock says in way of explanation or apology, even though he doesn’t feel like apologising. Regret is such a pointless emotion. “I’m usually alone in the apartment and I’ve become very used to doing things my own way. I’ve grown accustomed to not having help… You must be bored.”

Alec flicks his tail. “ _I’m fine,_ ” he says into the warlock’s mind, the first time he has spoken in hours. “ _If you need me to do anything…_ ”

Magnus bites the inside of his cheek. The truth is, he’s only doing _anything_ now because he doesn’t want Alec to know what he usually does. He isn’t like other warlocks, he doesn’t lend his services out to people, he doesn’t covertly assist in world problems or seek to help anyone outside the warlock community.

Mostly, he drinks. He goes out to his club, he surrounds himself with admirers, he sleeps with some of them, he drinks some more. Alec doesn’t seem like he would understand that. He is a Lightwood, a young man in a long and proud line of distinguished familiars. Lightwood’s are the most well-known familiars in the state, maybe the entire country. Alec has a reputation to uphold.

Magnus will ruin him more than any whispers of his abandonment ever could.

“Do you want lunch?” Magnus asks abruptly, leaving the potion ingredients where they are, leaving the book open on the counter as he walks away. It doesn’t mean anything; it’s just some generic poison remedy that Magnus doesn’t need anyway. It’s just something to do.

Alec follows him slowly, dropping casually from the workbench and landing with a grace that only felines can truly possess. He wanders around the kitchen, getting under Magnus’s legs as he fetches bacon and eggs from the fridge. Apparently, he has some purely cat-like instincts. Winding through his legs is one of the more irritating habits of the feline. Magnus doesn’t mind it, however. He has always had a special connection to cats; his mark ensures that.

It feels strange that Alec has a feline form. Magnus tries to focus on preparing his lunch, tries not to read too much into it. The fact that, after almost a century alone, the familiar who is finally bound to him would be a cat; it’s odd. It’s a bit too much of a coincidence to actually _be_ a coincidence.

When lunch is ready, he tosses it all onto a plate, save for a little scrap of bacon that had broken free.

“I have some spare if you want a bit,” he says, picks the morsel of bacon from the pan and blowing on it to cool it off. Alec winds through his legs, chirps insistently, and Magnus casts him a glance, half chiding, half fond. “No need for that,” he murmurs, leans down to offer the scrap of bacon to the familiar.

Alec takes it in sharp, white teeth, chewing and almost dropping it from snapping jaws, but Magnus knows it isn’t his fault. Cat’s chew that way; it’s just a fact of their nature. Personally, the warlock has always found it endearing.

“You can always change to human form and I’ll make you something proper,” says Magnus, determined to focus on anything except the fact of Alec’s animal form.

The familiar flicks his tail. “ _Business hours,_ ” he says while still eating his bacon. “ _It wouldn’t be appropriate_.”

“Is that what they teach you at that Institute of yours?” Magnus chuckles softly.

“ _Partly, but it’s mostly my own beliefs,_ ” replies Alec. “ _I’m a familiar. I’m most useful to you in this form. My magic is stronger like this and I can defend you should I need to._ ”

Magnus shakes his head, discomforted to learn how stubbornly traditional Alec is in his ways. He is a Lightwood, of course. Magnus should have expected nothing less. “You don’t need to be concerned with your usefulness, Alec. You’re not a tool. Warlocks and familiars have partnerships. You’re not a servant or a slave.”

“ _I’m also unclaimed_ ,” says Alec, a pink tongue rasping over his jaws as he lifts those inquiring eyes to the warlock’s face, “ _so, I’m nothing._ ”

Magnus inhales sharply through his nose and elects not to argue. They could be here all day if he does. He somewhat knows how Alec feels. He knows that familiars have a sharp sense of loss and feelings of abandonment when they go unclaimed by a warlock. He doesn’t necessarily _understand_ it—he isn’t a familiar after all—but he does know what it feels like to be lost.

He understands that Alec feels betrayed, but the familiar doesn’t seem to grasp his side of it. Perhaps he’s being too harsh with Alec too. Maybe Alec was right when he said that they simply didn’t understand one another, and maybe that’s all it is. If they understood one another a little better, perhaps Alec would cease in his incessant mission to be claimed. Perhaps they could both go back to their lives.

Magnus huffs softly, takes his lunch to the kitchen island and sits heavily. “Do you want a bowl of cat food or something?”

Alec flicks his tail and sticks his nose up, apparently unimpressed.

“Well, what then?” Magnus asks, watching Alec leap onto the stool beside him and make his way up onto the countertop. His first instinct is to chide him, but—as he has to remind himself—this is not one of his cats. “Forgive me, but I don’t know what you eat. It’s been a while since I had a familiar, and, even then, he lived off a crappy cut of mutton and a handful of stale biscuits every day—”

He bites his tongue, turns his face down and breathes out slowly. Now isn’t the time to be bringing up the past. He doesn’t want to talk about that anyway; he _never_ speaks of it and he doesn’t know why he started now. Alec apparently has a strange effect on him.

“ _Was that George?_ ”

Magnus blinks hard, turns wide eyes on the familiar. He hasn’t touched his food and he can’t possibly think of eating now. “How do you know that name?”

“ _The Registry of Familiars,_ ” Alec says, speaks into his mind, hazel eyes steady and unblinking as he sits, wraps his tail over his neatly aligned paws. “ _It has all known familiars and their warlock’s dating back five hundred years. It’s only supposed to be handled by the heads of the institute, but I had to find you… I wanted to know what you’d been through, so that I could better understand you._ ”

“You Lightwood’s really are the most intrusive bastards,” Magnus grumbles, averts his gaze from the familiar. “Don’t talk about my past. Don’t talk about _him_.”

“ _Yes, sir. I’m sorry._ ”

Magnus frowns softly, unsure now of whether to be angry or concerned. “And don’t call me that… I’m your warlock, not your master. We’re the same.”

Alec’s eyes bore into his own, compelling Magnus to meet his gaze, and it is calm despite his next words. “ _We’re not the same_ ,” he says, very deliberate. “ _I’m not like you. I’m a familiar. We are born to serve and, if we can’t, life feels meaningless. I’ve been alone and empty for five years._ ”

For a moment, Magnus just stares at him. “Try one hundred,” he growls. “Do not speak to me of loneliness, Alec. I have endured more than you could ever imagine.”

It isn’t a competition, of course, but Alec is fighting a losing battle. Magnus can barely even think of his past familiars without falling to darkness, so he tends not to. He certainly doesn’t speak of them to anyone; not even his closest friends get to hear of his familiars. They understand that it is too painful for him to talk about.

So, why would he even mention it to Alec?

“ _You had your familiars,_ ” Alec says and Magnus clenches his jaw. “ _You know how this world works. I’ve only read about it. I never had a warlock. I watched my brother and sister claimed by their own. I shook their warlock’s hands and they looked at me like I was the most pitiful thing they’d ever seen because they could sense it. I didn’t belong to anyone…_ ”

“Alec,” Magnus says, firmer now. “You have to understand what I am… Warlock’s usually don’t make it through the death of their familiars. I’ve had dozens of them. I should’ve been dead a long time ago… A large part of me wants to be dead now… I’m not someone who you should strive to be claimed by.”

Alec stares at him, those cat eyes so unwavering. “ _But you’re mine… and I’m yours._ ”

“No,” Magnus snaps, recognising the echoes of the claiming rites and despairing to be reminded of when he had last heard them. “Stop it. Stop pushing this. Do not recite the words to me like I don’t know what they mean… I was there when they were written. I helped _write_ them.”

Alec flicks his tail. “ _You want me to leave_ ,” he says, and it isn’t a question.

Magnus ducks his head, breathes out slowly to calm himself. Cruelty would get him nowhere, yet patience is not a virtue he has practiced for many years. If Alec had been here in another time, maybe things could have been different.

“Return to your institute, Alec. We can try again another day… If I vow to try and make more of an effort, will you agree to stop pestering me about your claiming? I must make it clear to you that I cannot claim you, at least not for a while. I need you to respect that decision.”

Hazel eyes glow almost amber in the candlelight. “ _Yes, sir_ ,” he says and Magnus lets it slide because he knows that Alec does it only to irritate him.

Magnus doesn’t let it rile him. An easier option—the _easiest_ option—maybe for both of them, is if Magnus is able to push the familiar away thoroughly enough that he can move on, maybe align himself with a wanderer. All he wishes for is Alec’s happiness.

Magnus is good at pushing people away, but Alec is stubborn. He’s a Lightwood, of course—and his animal form a feline like his mother’s—and stubbornness is a trademark trait of their proud and ancient bloodline. If Alec Lightwood has even the smallest trace of his mother’s personality in him, he will be blindly and instantly loyal; loyal to a fault perhaps. Maryse certainly was to her last warlock.

 _This one_ —he thinks as he watches Alec pounce from the countertop and stalk towards the door— _this one will be a challenge._


	6. Friends and Foe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alec pays a visit to his sister at her warlock's apartment, seeking comfort from someone he holds in the highest regard. An incident at Magnus's loft has him disregarding his warlock's wishes for Alec to stay away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to @dani_dabbles, @all_fandoms_reader, @PrincessTiannah, @Vallier, @lawchaos, @Liz_060, @Melpomeme55, @Juneannhodge, @MissYouSoFar, @PhoenixStar73, @mimi39, @Cptkai_87, @kokomi33, @master_girl, @sosowhat, @catattacked, and @AbbyJayWall because, wow, there were lots of comments on that last chapter!
> 
> There is honestly no greater feeling than reading your thoughts as this story progresses, so a huge thank you for giving me that.
> 
> Just a forewarning: there is almost a 100% chance of me contradicting myself with the lore at some point. Feel free to point it out if you spot any inconsistencies and it's bugging you. There's so much going on in this story, honestly. I don't think I've ever attempted something this complex before. It's exciting!

Alec knocks on the door of Clary’s apartment as dusk is falling, knowing that his sister will be there.

Isabelle never stays at the institute any longer than necessary. Their parents had stopped calling her in at this point, relying on Jace to assist in teaching and training the new familiars. Isabelle prefers to focus on her familiar duties rather than family duties. Alec didn’t blame her. He would rather be with Magnus than with their parents, even if the warlock had kicked him out at midday.

Alec had wandered the streets in the hours before sunset, not wishing to interrupt Isabelle and her warlock during business hours.

The apartment door is a deep red wood with a bronze handle and a door knocker in the shape of a coiled serpent. It’s the door at the top of the fire escape ladder, rather than the one leading into the antique shop on the ground level. It’s a warlock’s door. Only those with magic can truly see it.

Clary Fray—or Clarissa Morgenstern to those not in the know—is the last in a long line of warlocks. Her ancestors dabbled in black magic, dark magic that none have dared to touch since her father had consumed himself in his obsession. Luckily, the young woman doesn’t take much from her father. She is fiercely proud of her mother, a mundane woman who was slaughtered in her husband’s insane experiments. She even kept her mother’s profession as an antique shop owner and her apartment above, although with a few magical touches.

As a result of her blood, Clary’s magic is weaker than those who have been sired from demons. She is often looked down by other warlocks and familiars because of it. Maryse Lightwood had been horrified to discover that her daughter had accepted claimant by a ‘half-breed’.

Isabelle is rebellious like that. Alec admires her more than he can say.

The door opens within seconds and Isabelle is throwing herself at him so fiercely that she almost topples them both over the edge of the railing. Alec wraps his arms around her, holds her tight. They don’t need to get into it all; they both know what happened. No doubt Jace and their parents have been gossiping.

The entire institute must have heard by now.

Upon making his way to the apartment, he hadn't truly known what he wanted from her. He hadn't exactly wanted to talk about him problems, knowing that there is nothing she can do and not wishing to burden her with his problems. Now, with her arms around him, he realises that his needs were simple: he is touch-starved. As weak as it makes him feel, he knows now that he just needed to be hugged.

“Are you okay?” his sister asks and Alec nods shortly. “I’ve talked to Clary about everything. She wants you to know that you can stay here as long as you need to.”

Alec frowns and shakes his head as he reluctantly prises himself from her arms. “I… I have Magnus.”

Isabelle gives him an unconvinced look. “Alec, Clary knows him. She’s gone to talk to him right now. She knows that he won’t let you stay with him and she doesn’t want you to be homeless. She’ll do what she can to convince him into at least letting you live with him, but there’s no telling—”

Again, Alec shakes his head, cutting her off mid-sentence. “I don’t want her to go begging on my behalf.”

“It’s not begging; it’s reasoning.”

“Same thing. Just depends on your attitude.”

Isabelle hums, stops abruptly and her head turns to the side, seemingly staring at nothing. “Clary,” she utters, her eyes wide and panicked.

Pain blooms in his sternum and Alec gasps and clutches his chest, the pressure of it making him grimace. He has felt this kind of thing before. “What’s…?” he begins and glances to his sister in panic. If they are both feeling pain and their warlocks are together… “Izzy, you don’t think—”

Isabelle doesn’t reply in words, simply slips into her animal form and disappears in a coil of black and red and the tell-tale purple of Clary’s magic. Alec panics very briefly, believing himself unable to follow. He isn't claimed, Magnus hasn't summoned him, and simple pain has never been enough in the past. If he could've gone to Magnus when the warlock was hurting himself, he would have done so.

Still, he can't help but try. He does what all those books said; he thinks of Magnus, forces himself to feel every emotion the warlock ignites in him, all that grief and anger and sorrow and longing. A flash of gold overcomes him, burning behind his closed eyes. When he opens them again, he is at his warlock's side.

They are in Magnus’s apartment. The place is a mess and the owner is on the floor, his eyes wide as he turns his head to the cat that appears beside him.

“Alec—”

Alec doesn’t stop to hear the rest, angling himself to the danger, a rogue warlock that he doesn’t recognise, turning her magic on Clary. Isabelle is coiled in front of her, striking out with gleaming fangs. Relief sinks in that their warlocks aren’t fighting one another and Alec snarls when he sees the strange warlock’s familiar, a white-blonde honey badger snarling and scurrying at Magnus. Alec leaps at it.

He smacks it away, claws slipping out and scoring the floor. He stands, displays his size and strength and the power of Magnus’s magic, every animalistic instinct taking over to defend his warlock.

The honey badger snarls at him and Alec gives it a warning yowl, lashes claws at the air between them to force it back further. They are designed to protect, not attack. This rogue warlock and her familiar are breaking their arcane rules. The warlocks may fight one another, but familiar do not go on the assault. Their role is defence at any cost.

A hand comes to his back and strength rushes through him. He feels his eyes flare with heat, his blood burning in his veins, every strand of fur across his body standing on end. The honey badger whines and runs back to their warlock. The woman looks around at the disturbance, her eyes narrowing in malice.

“Magnus,” she says and Alec feels the hand disappear from his back. The strength it brought him remains, however. “You’ve got yourself another familiar… Unclaimed though. A shame.”

“Get the hell out of my house,” Magnus snaps, casting a gold-crimson blast to the woman and forcing her back a step.

She stumbles back with a wince, but chuckles and straightens just as quickly, a manicured hand pushing dark hair back from her pale, made-up face. “I’m not leaving without what I came for, Bane. I’ll pry it from your dead hands if I have to.”

Magic flares her fingers, blood-red, and Alec bares his teeth in a snarl, stepping in front of Magnus and lashing his tail back and forth. Claimed or not, the threat has stirred the instincts ingrained in him as a familiar. No one threatens to hurt his warlock without a challenge.

The rogue woman smiles cruelly at him. “You poor, misguided creature,” she mutters.

She moves quickly and Alec sees very little option. The muscles in his legs pull taut and he pounces at her, taking the full force of the blast she tries to aim at Magnus. It flings him back, slamming him to the ground. Magnus calls out to him, his voice stricken in panic and almost cut off with a scream of pain from the opposing warlock.

When Alec lifts his head, dazed, Isabelle has sunk her fangs into the warlock’s leg and Magnus is conjuring a portal. As soon as the rogue warlock has shaken the snake from herself, Magnus is sending a blast of magic to her chest, casting her and her familiar backwards through the rushing vortex and snapping it shut behind her.

As soon as it’s done, Magnus whips around and runs to Alec, falling to his knees beside the familiar. “Alec,” he says urgently, a concerned hand falling to his flank. “Alec, are you hurt?”

“ _No, I’m alright,_ ” Alec replies, speaking into his warlock’s mind as he struggles to his paws. “ _Who were they?_ ”

“The warlock’s name is Camille,” says Magnus, his eyes still bright with anxiety. “She been stealing spell books from warlock’s all over the city. Her familiar—Heidi—is newer to our world, but apparently takes her animal form very literally. Vicious girl. Takes after her warlock.”

Alec shifts his weight to ensure nothing is damaged before he returns to human form. The magic that engulfs him is less intense now than that he had taken earlier, less intense than Magnus’s power when it joined with his own. He feels strange, like he needs to shake a surplus of energy away.

“What did she want from you? Your books?” Alec asks and Magnus doesn’t respond, just staring at him. “What…?”

“You shouldn’t have come here,” Magnus says, grabs Alec by the shoulders once he is comfortably back into human form. He doesn’t sound angry, not really. He just seems afraid. “Putting yourself between us… Alec, you could have been killed, do you understand that?”

“That’s my job, Magnus,” says Alec, defiant of his warlock’s anxiety. “I protect you. I will defend you with my life if I have to. That’s what I’m for.”

Magnus shakes his head. “No, you’re not a shield! We are equals.”

Alec huffs softly. “Well, it’s not like I’d know,” he says, gives Magnus a stern look. “You shut me out.”

Magnus grits his teeth. “It’s not the time for that now.”

He stands, goes to the door and lifts his hands to it. Gold magic flares his fingers. Alec recognises warding spells well enough by now. Magnus’s must need strengthening if that warlock was able to simply walk right in. He reaches out with their shared mind, feels Magnus’s strength waning, feels the wards struggle to build under his magic.

Alec casts his gaze to search for his sister, finds her back in her human form, curled up on Magnus’s sofa with her warlock. He watches Clary comb her fingers into Isabelle’s hair, thanking her and praising her with soft words. It’s too intimate to watch for long. He looks to Magnus, his own warlock, reinforcing the wards around his apartment, and wanders up to him.

“Do you need help?” he asks, forcing a lightness to his voice that he doesn’t feel. “It’ll be stronger with both of us working on it.”

Magnus barely looks to him, shakes his head. “I’m fine. I just need to be more vigilant with my wards. I've become too comfortable these past years.”

Alec stifles a sigh, knowing that he is trying to change the subject and unable to allow it. “Magnus, my job is to—”

“Protect me, I know,” Magnus finishes for him, “and you did. Thank you. Now, you can go back to your institute." Alec blinks hard, taken aback by his bluntness, but Magnus's dark eyes hold no sympathy. "I haven’t accepted you as my familiar, remember? This isn’t your home.”

Alec clenched his jaw. “You are… so infuriating.”

Magnus snaps golden eyes to him, his glamour falling, and Alec takes a step back. “You don’t know anything about me,” Magnus growls. “Know this now. I am not built for companionship. If you are so desperate to be someone’s familiar, go and offer yourself to a wanderer.”

“I don’t want a wanderer,” says Alec. “They are for familiars whose warlocks abandoned or never claimed them or disconnected their bond. They are lost souls searching to be made a little less lonely. I am not lost, Magnus. I know who my warlock is and he is standing here in front of me. Alive.”

Magnus huffs softly. “Half alive at best.”

“At worst, you would be dead,” says Alec, “but you’re not. There’s a reason you didn’t go back to that bridge after I talked you down. There has to—”

Alec cuts off when Magnus lifts a hand to his lips, touches them lightly to make him stop. “Do not... _ever_ talk about that when there are other people in this house. In fact, I don’t want you to speak of it under any circumstances. That night never happened. Do you understand me?”

Alec nods slowly, watches Magnus’s hand lower from his lips. The movement had been oddly intimate, but it is far scarier when Magnus is quiet than when he’s shouting. Alec knows he means it.

“I just want you to be safe,” says Alec, quieter now. “That’s all.”

Magnus breathes out slowly, averting his gaze. “I know,” he murmurs and he sounds almost resigned now. Alec fights not to flinch, feeling the exhaustion seeping from the warlock like a plague. “I know. I’m just… I’m tired.”

“Rest then,” Alec says. “I can take care of the wards.”

There’s a twitch in Magnus’s jaw like Alec couldn’t be more irritating. Alec has seen that same twitch far too many times; it was one of his mother’s favourite looks. “I don’t need you.”

A sickness rises from Alec’s stomach and he swallows hard to fight it down. “You’ve made that clear.”

“Then why do you keep pushing me?!” Magnus snaps, ducks his gaze when it draws the attention of Isabelle and Clary. “Get out. All of you.”

“Magnus,” Alec says, tries to grab his hand, but Magnus wrenches it away.

“Don’t,” he orders, taking a step back. The hand Alec had attempted to grab is half held up in defence or warning and Alec knows that he's inadvertently triggered something in his warlock. “Don’t touch me. I don’t want you here.”

He’s walking away before Alec can even think of speaking or reaching for him again. Clary pushes herself from the sofa, hurrying after him with a gentle, albeit anxious, call of “Magnus” and disappearing after him into the apothecary. Their familiars watch them go, silent a moment before Isabelle pushes herself to her feet.

“Come on,” she says, walking to her brother and giving his arm a light touch. “We’ll do no good here.”

“He hates me,” Alec utters, the truth of it finally sinking in.

Isabelle shakes her head. “Don’t say that. Of course he doesn’t, he’s just… he’s lived a really long time, Alec. He’s been through a lot, that’s all.”

Alec closes his eyes, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. “He’s so sad,” he whispers, fighting to shake the feeling, but Magnus’s home is drenched in his sorrow. “This whole place… It smells like—like copper, like metal. It smells like _blood_ , Izzy. It’s so dark in here. Can’t you feel it?”

“No, Alec, I can’t,” Isabelle says gently. “He’s your warlock, not mine. I’m sorry… I don’t feel anything.”

Alec swallows hard, looks towards the closed door of the apothecary through which their warlocks had disappeared. “I’m going to stay with him, Izzy,” he says in a firm vow, turning back to meet Isabelle’s unconvinced gaze and steeling his own in response. “I’m going to save him.”


End file.
